2019 Tribute Award Recipients
Tribute Award for Leadership: Elaine Whitmore
Throughout
Elaine Whitmore’s 17-years as CEO of John McGivney Children’s Centre
(JMCC), the centre grew in the numbers of children and families served,
volunteers engaged with the centre and its clients, and its staff
complement. JMCC also responded to the needs of the Windsor-Essex
community by significantly expanding its scope of services.
Committed
to ensuring JMCC is a state-of-the-art children’s treatment centre that
is welcoming, fully accessible and family friendly, Elaine led an
extensive renovation project that was supported by provincial funding,
and a successful staff and community fundraising campaign. JMCC also
opened Play McGivney together with the adjacent Hotel Dieu Hospital, a
fully accessible outdoor playground for all ages and abilities, and
completed an indoor Smilezone renovation to create welcoming and fun
indoor public spaces.
JMCC achieved many milestones related to
improved service delivery during Elaine’s tenure. The centre is the sole
provider of School-Based Rehabilitation Services in the area, ensuring
the highest quality of rehabilitation services are provided to children
attending schools. On-site clinics from London Health Sciences Centre
expanded to meet growing local needs for pediatric orthopedic,
rheumatology and genetics expertise, eliminating the need for families
to travel outside Windsor-Essex for these services. A renewed focus on
recreational therapy resulted in expanded opportunities to support
therapy goals and social inclusion.
Elaine has been a tireless
advocate for ensuring JMCC families are at the centre of care. Under her
leadership JMCC adopted a clear family-centred program and developed a
Family Advisory Network whose members play an important role in centre
decisions.
As a highly respected and involved member of the
Windsor-Essex community, Elaine built strong relationships with local
system partners, decision-makers and influencers, including in the
ever-growing technology sector, to advancer the sector and to promote
client independence, improved quality of life and inclusion for kids
with disabilities and their families.
Tribute Award for Partnership: Adele Kirby
Collaboration
is at the heart of everything for Adele Kirby, who practices and
nurtures partnerships with regional agencies and local providers, and
with colleauges across Ontario. Her commitment has created
interdisciplinary programs that are integral to One Kids Place (OKP),
inspirational to centre staff and peers across the province, and that
will impact communities for years to come.
One
of the first to join the team when OKP was established, Adele later
founded the centre’s office in Gravenhurst, and developed the strong
programs for the communities of Muskoka and Parry Sound that are today
the significant portion of OKP’s services. She worked with community
partners across Northern Ontario to create a family-centred service
delivery system that benefits all kids with disabilities and their
families, and enhances lives. Adele’s work helped make OKP a home to
community partners including the Nipissing Association for Disabled
Youth, the North Bay chapter of Autism Ontario, PLAYS, EarlyON, and the
Section 23 Transition to School Program.
Adele believes that
partnership with community agencies improves services overall, and
evidence of this is apparent in programs such as the Sound Community Hub
in Parry Sound, a unique partnership that co-locates OKP’s office with
local service agencies and has become a model replicated by cities and
towns across Ontario. Other examples of this collaborative
family-centred approach include the Early Start Denver Model,
Coordinated Service Planning, Early Years and Best Start, and Get Ready
for Kindergarten, a unique outside the box pilot to ensure all kids are
ready and able to be successful in school.
A graduate of
University of Toronto’s Speech-Language Pathology program, Adele is
known for remaining current with trends and advance is her field and her
incorporating knowledge into best in class programs and services. She
mentors with an ability to listen, motivate and encourage, building team
with a depth of knowledge and positive approach to leadership that is
respected by all.
“We’re thrilled to see these fantastic
colleagues recognized and honoured by their peers and their
communities,” says EKO CEO Jennifer Churchill. “Elaine and Adele have
shown us how to keep kids at the centre in our evolving environment, and
we are inspired by their many contributions to ensuring Ontario kids
with special needs and their families live their best lives.”